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I have met few Muslims who always tell me that the Christian Bible is corrupted. They say that the Torah was revealed by Allah to Jews and New Testament to Christians. Is this correct? If so, which one of these statements is correct?

  1. Some part of the Bible is corrupted. If this is true, does the Qur'an or Muhammad(pbuh) gave any information how to discern which part is corrupted and which part is not?
  2. The whole Bible is corrupted. If this is true, where is the original Bible and how did it get lost?
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  • This needs some research. but as far as I know, many bibles were written by popes (or other Christ religion men). Everything that's written by humans is not bible according to Islam.
    – Tamer Shlash
    May 26, 2014 at 10:50
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    @TamerShlash I don't mean to be rude but isn't Qura'n also written by man? I mean, did the first copy of Qur'an fall from the sky?
    – Mawia
    May 26, 2014 at 10:55
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    I think I didn't choose the right word. I mean "bibles were authored by humans". It's not about who wrote it to papers but rather who authored it. Quran is authored by Allah (God), the original Bible was also authored by Allah (as well as all heavenly books). But current bibles were authored by humans and replaced the original bible. That's the problem. BTW asking questions is not rude at all :)
    – Tamer Shlash
    May 26, 2014 at 11:28
  • I think the bigger problem is not that the bible is corrupt but that what the church is preaching is not in the 4 Gospels e.g. the trinity and the atonement of sins of mankind through the sacrifice of Jesus, and this forms the foundation of the chrisitian religion.
    – Asan Ramzan
    Nov 13, 2018 at 5:05
  • @TamerShlash its been a while, but no, there is not a Bible written by a Pope. The Catholic Church compiled the Bible as we have it today, but they did not write it.
    – Luke Hill
    Dec 3, 2021 at 18:50

2 Answers 2

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The Qur'an itself doesn't use the word "Bible", but "Torah", "Zabur" and "Injeel" which were revealed to Moses, David and Jesus respectively. Meanwhile, the Bible was written by some 40 authors, many of whom the Qur'an doesn't recognize. For example, a large chunk of the New Testament was written by Paul, whom the Qur'an doesn't recognize as a Prophet, so the term "New Testament" is meaningless to the Qur'an. Many of the teachings of Paul contradicted that of Jesus, for example, Jesus said in Matthew 5:17,

Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.

and also added that (Luke 16:16),

It is easier for heaven and earth to disappear than for the least stroke of a pen to drop out of the Law

Which are supported by the verse of the Qur'an (61:6) which states,

O children of Israel, indeed I am the messenger of Allah to you confirming what came before me of the Torah

Meanwhile, Paul spent his entire ministry arguing for the futility of the Law. In fact, Muslims don't believe the writings of Paul to be properly called a "corruption" but as forgery (Q2:79),

So woe to those who write the "scripture" with their own hands, then say, "This is from Allah ," in order to exchange it for a small price. Woe to them for what their hands have written and woe to them for what they earn.

In a summary,

  1. Muslims believe that any "subsequent inspiration" from Jesus after his ascension to be forgery, and these includes all of the writings of Paul. This also includes teachings such as "Go, teach all nations" (especially if we're to understand "nations" to include non Jewish people), as Muslims believe Jesus was sent to the Jews ONLY a fact which was also corroborated by Jesus himself during his ministry. Muslims believe there was no other prophet between Jesus and Muhammad.

  2. The Gospels according to Matthew, Mark, Luke and John contain some of the teachings of Jesus, but they are not the injeel. They were so-called "eye witness" accounts of some of the disciples of Jesus about his life. Muslims disagree about their account of the crucifixion and even these gospels disagree on some points between themselves.

So to conclude, Muslims primarily agree with No. 1 i.e. "Some of the Bible is corrupted". The yardstick Muslims use is to prefer the Qur'an version whenever there's a conflict between the Qur'an and the Bible. Traditionally, Muslims also disagree with some of the less flattering descriptions of the Prophets such as Lot, Solomon and David, which they find unbecoming of the Prophets of God.

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    How can you first say that the new testament is meaningless to the Quran while you quote verses from the New Testament (Gospel of Matthew which is not recognised as a Protphet either) to prove your point?
    – Kilise
    Feb 22, 2017 at 10:59
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The muslim point of view on "corrupt Bible" is in fact not complete in itself and quite misleading too comparing to Christian own view. According to Muslims Belief, Bible was revealed as book. Quoting from Reference

According to the commentators of the Quran, the Quran was revealed in pieces in 23 years, while the Torah and the Bible was revealed completely at one time

and

We could not find sound data about where the Bible was revealed.

This is against Christian belief according to which Bible was inspiration from holy men after the death of Jesus Christ. It was not written by Jesus not revealed to Jesus, because Jesus was God himself. He did not receive any revelation or any book.

So Muslims perspective of Bible (Torah and Injeel) is totally different from Christian perspective. There is no explanation in Muslim literation how Bible was revealed and how it got corrupted. It is believed though it was revealed as entire book and then people made changes in it when they were translating and retranslating. A view very different from Christian's belief.

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    "It is believed though it was revealed as entire book", which is again in contradiction to Christian believe. They believe that the books of the Bible were written within 2000 years. The Bible did not come in the form of a single book in a day. It is a compilation of books written within 2000 years.
    – Mawia
    May 26, 2014 at 7:56
  • @DavidWallace the Islamic point of view of Bible is not only misleading, it is utterly wrong. Jesus did not receive any book. A wrong assumption at the time of Muhammad (PBUH) turned into a solid wrong belief. This is one of them. It can be said that Quran is inspiration from Bible. Since Jesus received a book, so did Muhammad. But the fact is Jesus did not receive any book. At least that is what I came to learn. No where in biblical scripture says he received a book.
    – muslim1
    Jul 12, 2014 at 13:22

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